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California, where the graft is greener

October 8, 2010

by Steve Milloy
GreenHellBlog, October 8, 2010.

The banana-fication of California is reaching critical mass.

The Antelope Valley Union High School District has entered into public-private partnership (taxpayer beware!) with private firm PsomasFMG to build a 9.6 megawatt photovoltaic system, according to a report in Climatewire. And what a deal it is.

The school system, which expects to save $40 million over the life of the panels (no word of how long “life” is), will not have to put any money down, instead signing a 20-year power purchase agreement with PsomasFMG for about 80 percent of its power needs. Southern California Edison will generously provide the other 20 percent at a reduced rate. A “bonus” feature of the deal is that PSomas will donate $20,000 to train a teacher to design a special algebra curriculum (6th grade to high school) to train students to work in the solar industry. Solar algebra? Are you kidding me?

But while the school district is “saving” millions in electricity bills (who knows how the “savings” were actually calculated), federal and state taxpayers will be paying for this scam, including a 22-cents-per-kilowatt-hour subsidy from the state-run California Solar Initiative. While it apparently is illegal for school districts to get federal funding for such projects directly, the project will evade the law by using PsomasFMG as the subsidy recipient. Try a scheme like that at home with, say, federal tax or election laws and see in which federal prison you land!

And many Californians appear to approve of this sort of activity.

A new Reuters/Ipsos poll claims that Proposition 23, a ballot initiative to roll back California’s global warming law until unemployment recedes, is losing 49%-37%. That any Californian who could vote himself out of a paper bag would oppose Proposition 23 is incredible — the state has a budget deficit of $19 billion and and unemployment rate of 12 percent. The state needs to create economic growth and revenue producing jobs as opposed to innovative ways to milk a shrinking tax base.

Perhaps, we can hope, the poll is just another mainstream media ploy to discourage voters from turning out to save California from the green grifters.

In any event, the people behind the Antelope Valley school district scheme should be investigated — not cemented in place by the defeat of Proposition 23.

I do not know about California, but, here in Greece, the only algebra these parasites indulge in, is “how much extra money do I need from the taxpayer to make a good return”. The country is going down the tubes and the “renewables” industry, here with blatant pressure from the Germans is about to finish us off. (and we have nothing like the vast land expanses of the SW US)

The most dangerous part of what we face is the big guys (in the case I’m thinking of McDonalds, Intervet Schering Plough Animal Health, JBS, and Cargill) paying to play the game (in this case with WWF).

Imagine agribusinesses joining forces with an anti-production organisation like WWF and putting on a sustainable livestock conference in Denver.

We’ve been producing livestock in the US and Australia (my two countries of citizenship) for a long time now. We keep getting better and better at what we do. That meets my definition of sustainable. And we now feel the need to get a tick of approval from WWF? WTF?

We have many examples in history of what happens when people tax and regulate producers out of existence (well, Stalin just killed them).

But we do not need to go back in history to find these examples. California provides us with one live and up-close. I’m sorry for you Californian producers.

Thank you and it is already happening. We have had something like 200,000 people leave the state since Obama crashed the equities markets as it became clear he would be President. Market people can smell a socialist 2000 miles away; their antenna go up and their checkbooks go “snap.”

This IS proposition AB32. The CA government is going ahead before the public votes on the issue. I agree with you, Steve that the school, company and gov’t officials involved should be investigated. Should I be surprised? NO! I grew up in SF, the union capitol of CA, and have seen a lifetime of corruption, environmental fanaticism, political pandering, and wasted public funds.
Most Californians really have no idea of the issues at stake. They live in Disneyworld. Well, they are in for the surprise of their lives. I just hope other states have the intelligence to not follow California’s initiative, because it means bankruptcy, more job losses, and a larger homeless population.

California is totally corrupt and has been since Jerry Brown was last Governor, maybe before. He created the first public employee unions that now have a $367 to $500 billion unfunded pension fund that taxpayers are supposed to pay. When you sum the salaries, benefits and pensions of out police, highway patrol, prison guards and other public employee union members we find that we are paying them three times what they would make for equal work in the private sector. Municipalities can file bankruptcy and escape these obligations, so they will and the state will follow. We will soon be replaying “Grapes of Wrath,” but not as a movie, it will be our reality.